


break

by RaineyDay



Series: Febuwhump 2021 [15]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 01:16:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29501883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaineyDay/pseuds/RaineyDay
Summary: Febuwhump day 16: broken bonesMortality is a tricky thing to readjust to.
Relationships: Angus McDonald & Taako, Barry Bluejeans & Magnus Burnsides & Davenport & Merle Highchurch & Lucretia & Lup & Taako, The Director | Lucretia & Taako
Series: Febuwhump 2021 [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2138502
Comments: 2
Kudos: 22





	break

It shouldn't have been frightening. It shouldn't have been a big deal. So a friend broke a bone, it wouldn't kill her.

The problem was that this particular friend was more vulnerable than they were used to, and it didn't hit them until this moment.

Carey had mentioned the incident to Magnus pretty casually, as if it were no problem, when they were hanging out as they did just about every week.

And Magnus had met her casual nature with his own, not letting himself worry too much because he could see that Carey wasn't worried. He'd told everybody else, so that they would know, but he hadn't let it scare him.

Lucretia had broken her arm. But it was okay. She got it looked by a healer pretty quickly, and they'd fixed her right up and there would be no lasting damage. If it weren't for the cast, no one would even know it had happened, and everyone knew that if you could, it was best to wear a cast for a bit after breaking an arm, even when you had a healer to work on it for you. It was more of a precaution than anything else.

But despite this being a completely ordinary thing to do, despite the totally unimportant, minor nature of the injury, nobody could seem to stop staring at the cast at family dinner that week.

The only ones immune from the staring were Kravitz and Angus, and Lucretia found herself locking eyes with them frequently over the evening, confused as to the reactions that the rest of her family was having to this situation. They didn't seem to have anything helpful to offer as an explanation, though, so she remained bemused throughout the meal.

Everyone was being - _so nice_. They weren't normally mean or cruel, but they all had a tendency to tease each other and to make jokes and to annoy and inconvenience each other for the sake of their own amusement.

But they weren't doing that tonight. Her family members kept offering to do or grab things for her, even though she was ambidextrous, and therefore not all that bothered by being unable to use one arm, as it was just as simple to use the other for whatever task she needed. Only using her right arm for things was a bit of an annoyance at times, but not a real problem by any means.

And yet, her family was smothering her with assistance: pulling out her chair for her, getting her plate ready for her, taking her dishes to the sink for her.

It was a sweet gesture, she supposed. And she appreciated it. But it was still- just really weird.

It was especially weird because they wouldn't usually act like this when anybody else got hurt. Not back on the Starblaster, not during the time she'd hired the boys, and not in the days since Story and Song.

It was just- her. On this one occasion. And she couldn't understand it at all.

-

Angus had a suspicion as to why his family was being so weird, but he wouldn't voice it, because it was way too personal for him to comfortable saying anything. He didn't even really feel comfortable guessing that kind of thing- at least, not when he then had to act on it. He _could_ do it- he was the world's greatest detective, and that included detecting emotional states- but there was no way to prove his suspicions when it came to emotions- not like he could with facts.

Moreover, the adults in his family weren't always the best at handling or understanding their own emotions, and it would be a _mess_ if he told them before they were ready to accept it.

When Magnus came home from hanging out with Carey, and shared what she'd said about Lucretia's injury, everyone had been appropriately concerned, but nobody was worried. Of course they weren't. It was _Lucretia._ She wasn't going to be taken down by a broken arm. Was that even a thing that could kill _anyone_?

And it was healed up and everything was fine.

But later that week, when Lucretia arrived for family dinner, everyone immediately got stuck looking at the cast, and they hadn't really stopped since.

Clearly, the fear had been triggered by that visual image. The idea of Lucretia being minorly injured wasn't enough to frighten them. The sight was.

Sight was a very evocative sense; Angus wasn't too surprised by that. But what exactly had the sight triggered for the others?

If Angus had to guess, it had to do with the fact that the cast made Lucretia visibly different, and, more importantly, visibly _damaged_.

For so long, they'd all looked about exactly the same. They didn't age enough in a year for the reset to change much of anything on that front, and aside from Lup and Barry becoming liches, and even that hadn't been a constant state, the crew of the Starblaster had looked just about exactly the same for a century.

And they looked different now than they did then, of course. They were older, even if the signs of a decade were really only obvious on humans.

And Lucretia was oldest, by a lot. At least, for a human, that is.

Angus suspected that the rest of them might only be starting to realize that completely right now.

They'd known she was older than she had been during the journey of course. They couldn't not, with how much older she was than she should be, as well as the fact that she'd outright told them when she'd been preparing the Reclaimers to enter Wonderland.

But when they'd met Lucretia again, she'd already been that old, and they couldn't remember the century's worth of memories saying that she shouldn't be that way. And for Lup and Barry, they'd had much bigger concerns to deal with than her age when they met her again.

And by now, the crew had grown used to the sight. They'd adjusted enough to forget how old she was. How old she was supposed to be. And how much of a difference there was between the two.

And the cast was a reminder of that, because it was a visible difference that they had time to think about. It showed that she had gotten hurt. It was a visible reminder of her vulnerability, a vulnerability that most of crew had not yet adjusted back to yet, still too used to being able to wake up again at the start of a new year. They'd forgotten what is was to be mortal.

She was hurt. And it was just obvious enough to remind them that they were going to lose her. Far sooner than they should have to. Far sooner than any of them were comfortable with.

Angus was pretty sure he was right about why they were all so affected, but he wouldn't say anything because he wasn't certain.

Least, he wasn't certain until he walked past Taako and Kravitz's room that night- not eavesdropping on purpose, he swears!- and heard Taako sobbing helplessly, miserable and almost unable to put words to why.

Angus didn't like thinking about it either.


End file.
